The car will compete under the Garage 56 entry - an extra grid spot for invited vehicles at the cutting edge of racing technology. Nissan says its road cars, like the all-electric Leaf, will benefit from innovations in the vehicle.

"A zero emission on demand option where the driver can switch between electric and petrol-powered drive is a future direction for road cars," said Nissan vice-president Andy Palmer. "So that will be tested in addition to pure electric power and other new technologies that we still have under development."